Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

Redskins Nation is a half-hour show devoted to giving fans unfiltered access to the day's events at Redskins Park. Hosted by Larry Michael, the show features Redskins players, coaches and sit-down interviews with team officials. (Show re-airs at 11:30 p.m/7:30 a.m. daily)

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Just before Donovan McNabb‘s Kids Football Clinic yesterday, I asked Clinton Portis when we might see the Clinton Portis Football Camp. The question was half-joking, but he answered completely seriously, noting that his friends Santana Moss and Edgerrin James had camps, and then musing, “So many people got ’em, it’s like, I could go to their camp. You go out to support theirs, it’s just like yours. When you’re here, everybody who’s [helping] here, it’s their camp, not just Donovan’s.”

Portis wasn’t kidding about this. He was manning the rushing drills station, along with Brian Westbrook and Eagles fullback Leonard Weaver, and the three backs were making enough noise to drown out the music, the air horn, and all 300 kids. They were making enough noise that the event organizer even took notice.

From left to right (facing the camera, mostly), that’s Brian Westbrook, Donovan McNabb, and Clinton Portis, in a lull just before the on-field start of McNabb’s Kids Football Clinic. It should be no surprise that Westbrook was there: he and McNabb were longtime teammates, and his brother Byron is currently McNabb’s teammate. But, of course, that’s not the angle that most people were taking.

Following head coach Mike Shanahan’s comments about Westbrook of a few weeks ago (“We want him to sign with us”), everyone wanted to impart just a little more significance to Westbrook’s presence at McNabb’s event, and during a brief session with the Philadelphia media, McNabb was asked if Westbrook would wind up in D.C.

“I dunno,” McNabb said, “that’s something you have to ask him. Obviously, y’all try and link me up with everybody who I played with to come play with me. But, I dunno, that’s his decision. Would I like him to come join us? I would love that, you know, but I know this game and how it goes and you know, we have three running backs that can run the ball.”

If you’re excerpting that for a headline, you probably pull “Would I like him to come join us? I would love that, you know…”. But I was more interested in the initial answer: that’s something you have to ask him. So I did.Read more »

The Donovan McNabb Kids Football Clinic on Saturday was well-attended, with over 300 kids, what looked like an equal number of media members, and more than a dozen of the quarterbacks past and present (and possibly future?) teammates helping out.

Everybody was there (as they say on the Bachelor) for the right reasons, of course.

Here’s Redskins running back Clinton Portis: “You’re talking about a guy who just got traded away from here coming back and continuing something he had goin’ on, in the midst of us going to OTAs and mini-camp. Anytime you see a guy the caliber of Donovan McNabb giving back, to be a part of that is a no-brainer.”

Here’s former Eagles running back Brian Westbrook: “Donovan’s a great guy. He’s been a great friend, a great teammate for the last eight years of my life, so anything that he ever needs from me, I’m always gonna be there for him. But, more important, I think it’s about the kids. These kids, they…they wanna participate in football and in sports, so anytime that we can give back and give a little encouragement, I’m definitely there for it.”

Here’s Fred Davis: “It’s about the kids. Helping out a teammate, sure, but mainly about the kids.”

So everyone was there for the kids — both the kids on the field, who were looking to learn or improve their basic football skills, and, father down the line, the kids that are helped by the Donovan McNabb Fund (which receives the proceeds from the clinic). But still, it seemed like a potentially uncomfortable situation to me, so I asked McNabb if it felt at all like showing up to a party with a new girlfriend and running into an ex.Read more »